1. Field of the Invention
The embodiments of the present disclosure relate to liquid ejectors and liquid ejecting detectors.
2. Description of the Related Art
An inkjet recording apparatus, for example, which ejects ink droplets from a recording head to form an image, is known as a liquid ejector for a printer, a facsimile machine, a copier, a plotter, a multifunction peripheral, etc.
Such an inkjet recording apparatus may be provided with a liquid ejecting detector which detects a condition of ejection of ink droplets from the recording head. In a case that a nozzle performing abnormal ejection of an ink droplet is detected by the liquid ejecting detector, a maintenance-and-recovery operation for the recording head, such as cleaning of a nozzle surface is, performed.
A liquid ejecting detector known in the art, for example, causes a recording head to eject a droplet toward an electrode plate, and then detects an electronic change that occurs when the droplet lands onto the electrode plate, thereby detecting whether or not a droplet is ejected (for example, see Japanese Patent No. 4735120).
Furthermore, a liquid ejecting detector is known in the art that cleans an electrode plate as described above with a wiper member that wipes the electrode plate while moving in the same direction as the moving direction of a carriage (for example, see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2004-306475).
When a wiper member performs wiping, waste liquid is attached to the wiper member, which may cause a decrease in wiping quality over time. Therefore, a cleaner may be applied in order to scrape off the waste liquid adhered to the wiper member.
Here, for example, waste liquid adhered to the wiping surface of the wiper may be scraped off with a scraper (a cleaner) having a straight ridge line, by making the flat surface of the wiper make contact with the scraper. In this case, the waste liquid runs off to the side ends in the direction perpendicular to the wiping direction of the wiper. As a result, waste liquid tend to accumulate on the scraper on both sides of the area which makes contact with the wiper.
In a case that waste liquid is accumulated on the cleaner in such a way, the accumulated waste liquid may interfere with the recording head or may become attached to the wiper, which may cause a decrease of wiping quality.
An object of an embodiment of the present invention is to reduce accumulation of waste liquid on the cleaner and to prevent a decrease of wiping quality of the wiper member.